Agriculture and Natural Resources

Bruce L. Berlage ’56

Born and raised on an Olney dairy farm, Bruce Berlage joined 4-H at age 9 and began amassing ribbons for his purebred Jersey cattle, Holstein cows and baby beef. He represented the National Future Farmers of America in greeting Princess Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinborough at the British Embassy in 1951. While a student at Maryland, he immersed himself in college life as a member of the dairy cattle and livestock judging teams and Block and Bridle Club. He joined the Men's Glee Club and Chapel Choir, and served as business manager of Old Linemagazine and WMUC radio, and as student government vice president. Long active in homebuilding, Berlage is managing partner of Beck & Berlage Real Estate. He is also a member of the National Association of Home Builders, lifetime director of the Northern Building Industry Association and chairman of Maryland 4-H Foundation, Inc. Berlage is active with the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, having established the Bruce and Donna Berlage Scholarship awarded to students who are active Maryland 4-H members.

Architecture, Planning and Preservation

Alex Klatskin M.Arch. ’88

Recognizing that good design should always be your guiding philosophy, Alex Klatskin is a partner with Forsgate Industrial Partners, which is widely regarded as having one of the finest industrial property portfolios in the nation. Before joining Forsgate in 1992, Klatskin worked with Kohn, Pedersen, Fox and Associates on commercial projects in New York and London. Committed to educating leaders on the power of architecture and design to improve lives and transform communities, Klatskin serves on the executive committee of the American Architectural Foundation. He is also vice-chairman of the National Association of Industrial and Office Properties and chairman of its political action committee. Klatskin serves on the Leaders Committee of the University of Maryland School of Architecture, the advisory board of the Johns Hopkins University St. John School of Real Estate, and has been a visiting architectural critic at universities. He is a member of the American Institute of Architects, the American Institute of Certified Planners and the Architectural League of New York.

Arts and Humanities

Yuriko Yamaguchi M.F.A. ’79

A native of Osaka, Japan, Yuriko Yamaguchi began her career as a sculptor after she immigrated to the United States in 1971. Her objects—often fashioned from carved wood or including organic materials like bones and seeds—are deceptively simple and exude great evocative strength. Her work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art in Kanagawa, Japan; the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden; the National Museum of Women in the Arts; and the Smithsonian American Art Museum. She has exhibited at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, the Corcoran Gallery of Art and at The Art Gallery at the University of Maryland. Her many honors include the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award, the Joan Mitchell Award and a National Endowment for the Arts Visual Arts fellowship. An assistant professorial lecturer at The George Washington University, Yamaguchi has completed numerous public commissions, and her work is sought after by private collectors.

Behavioral and Social Sciences

Lt. Gen. James R. Clapper Jr. (Ret.) ’63

Almost a year ago today—on April 11, 2007—James R. Clapper Jr., was confirmed by the U.S. Senate as Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence, making him the primary advisor on intelligence, counterintelligence and security matters. Clapper previously served as CEO for DeticaDFI and as director of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and the Defense Intelligence Agency. He retired as a lieutenant general from the U.S. Air Force in 1995, after a 32-year career. Clapper served two combat tours in Southeast Asia and flew 73 combat support missions in EC-47s over Laos and Cambodia. A congressional consultant and government advisor, he has won a host of honors, including three National Intelligence Distinguished Service Medals, the Defense Distinguished Service Medal with Oak Leaf Cluster, and distinguished service awards from the Air Force, Coast Guard, Department of Defense and NAACP. Clapper was conferred the National Security Medal by the president and has an honorary doctorate in strategic intelligence from the Joint Military Intelligence College.

Robert H. Smith School of Business

Richard Schaeffer ’74

Richard Schaeffer's phenomenal success at the helm of the preeminent trading forum for energy and precious metals is matched only by his tireless support for the University of Maryland. Schaeffer is chairman of NYMEX Holdings Inc., the New York Mercantile Exchange Inc., and a member of its board of directors since 1990. A Robert H. Smith School of Business graduate and commencement speaker, Schaeffer has served on the school’s Board of Visitors since 2006. He is a co-chair for the Smith School's Great Expectations campaign, making a generous leadership gift toward the university's landmark effort to raise $1 billion total in private support. In 2006 NYMEX sponsored the Smith School's China Business Plan Competition, as well as a documentary produced in collaboration with Maryland Public Television. Schaeffer also was an executive director of global energy futures for ABN Amro Inc., and a conferring member on behalf of the company and its predecessor on the New York commodity exchanges.

Chemical and Life Sciences

Joseph V. Rodricks M.S. ’63, Ph.D. ’68

As an expert in the field of toxicology and risk analysis, Joseph Rodricks has directed and conducted hundreds of studies examining the health and environmental risks of chemical products, processes, pollutants and wastes. For nearly three decades, he has consulted for manufacturers, government agencies and the World Health Organization, and served on 15 boards and committees of the National Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine. Rodricks served as deputy associate commissioner, Health Affairs, and toxicologist, with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for 15 years. He has produced 200 publications and lectured nationally and internationally. His experience includes chemical products and contaminants in foods, food ingredients, air, water, hazardous wastes, the workplace, consumer products and medical devices and pharmaceuticals. Rodricks is the author of Calculated Risks (Cambridge University Press), a non-technical introduction to toxicology and risk analysis that won an award from the American Medical Writers Association.

Computer, Mathematical and Physical Sciences

Jordan A. Goodman ’73, M.S. ’75, Ph.D. ’78

A pioneer in experimental particle astrophysics, Jordan Goodman has held every academic rank at Maryland, from freshman to full professor and department chair. He is recognized as one of the Department of Physics' top teachers and administrators, helping to propel the department to number four among public institutions in the nation. He also helped get the new Physical Sciences Center on the State Budget Plan and start the Joint Quantum Institute between Maryland and the National Institute of Standards and Technology. As part of the Super-Kamiokande experiment in Japan, he worked on the groundbreaking discovery in 1998 that the neutrino (a fundamental sub-atomic particle) has mass. At the Milagro Gamma Ray observatory in Los Alamos, he helped develop the technique of using water-Cherenkov detectors to do wide-field gamma ray astronomy. Goodman is currently part of the university's effort on the IceCube experiment to build a cubic kilometer detector beneath the South Pole. An in-demand speaker nationally and internationally, he has published more than 140 scientific papers.

Education

Christine A. Courtois M.A. ’73, Ph.D. ’79

Christine Courtois has spent the better part of her career helping others battle the wounds associated with psychological trauma. Now a psychologist in independent practice, she is co-founder and past clinical and training director of The Center: Posttraumatic Disorders Program at the Psychiatric Institute of Washington, D.C. A prolific publisher, Courtois has authored three books on treatment principles and guidelines for victims of sexual abuse, adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse and incest. She is currently co-editing a book on complex trauma treatment. Among her countless awards are the 2007 University of Maryland College of Education Alumni Outstanding Professional Award and The International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation Lifetime Achievement Award. She is an in-demand guest lecturer at universities and mental health organizations nationally and internationally and conducts professional training that has taken her around the world. She is currently co-director of the Maryland Psychological Association's Post-Doctoral Institute on Psychological Trauma.

A. James Clark School of Engineering

Michael S. Torok M.S. ’86, Ph.D. ’89

A passion for and vast experience in aviation has landed Michael Torok the role of chief engineer of U.S. Marine Corps programs for heavy lift helicopters for Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. The company designs, manufactures and services military and commercial helicopters, along with fixed-wing reconnaissance aircraft. Torok is responsible for a $3 billion program to develop the world's most advanced heavy lift helicopter to serve the U.S. Marine Corps for the next 50 years. He received the U.S. Army Distinguished Rotorcraft Fellowship and the American Helicopter Society's (AHS) Vertical Flight Foundation Fellowship. As a young engineer, he won the AHS Francois Xavier Bagnoud award, which recognizes outstanding contributions to vertical flight technology by a member under 30, and later the Gruppo Agusta International Award, for international vertical flight cooperation, as part of the Sikorsky/USG/ZFL Individual Blade Control Team. A technical fellow of the AHS, he has authored technical papers and publications, holds seven patents and is in the universitys Aerospace Engineering Academy of Distinguished Alumni.

School of Public Health

Kevin M. Clair ’82

It should come as no surprise that Kevin M. Clair has built a successful career in healthcare. He won the Fraley Award for most outstanding graduating senior in the College of Health and Human Performance, now the School of Public Health. Clair is currently co-owner and president of Health Solutions, which provides worksite health promotion services for employers and managed care plans nationwide, conducting health risk screenings and providing health risk reduction programs. The work of Health Solutions has contributed substantially to the academic literature describing worksite health program impact. Kevin's brother, Bill Clair, founded the company in 1991. Previously, Clair managed outpatient services and affiliated enterprises for hospital systems. A fellow of the Association for Worksite Health Promotion, his writings on design and financial management of health promotion programs have been published in North America and Europe. He is a member of the University of Maryland School of Public Health Board of Visitors and the Colonnade Society.

Information Studies

Jane Kinney Meyers M.L.S. ’78

Lubuto is a word in the Bemba language, spoken in central Africa, that signifies knowledge, enlightenment and light. Jane Kinney Meyers has worked to brighten the lives of children in Africa through the Lubuto Library Project. As the organization’s president and founder, she helps to create libraries for Africa’s orphans and vulnerable children while raising awareness in the United States of the devastating effects AIDS has on Africa’s people. A 1979 Master’s of Library Sciences graduate, Meyers is a professional librarian with almost 25 years of experience working in Africa. In Malawi, she developed a network of research libraries for the country’s Ministry of Agriculture. In Zambia, she created a library at a drop-in shelter for street children, and was named an honorary member of the country’s Library Association. Her career has focused largely on international development, including working for the World Bank and the U.S. National Agricultural Library. She received the Dow Jones Factiva Leadership Award from the Special Libraries Association, or SLA, and the Washington, D.C., SLA Chapter’s Board of Directors Award.

Philip Merrill College of Journalism

Connie Chung ’69

Connie Chung has been a correspondent, anchor and host at CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN and MSNBC. A Washington, D.C., native, she entered the national broadcasting scene in 1971 as correspondent for CBS Evening News with Walker Cronkite during Watergate. She later co-anchored CBS Evening News with Dan Rather, covering the historic White House Israel/PLO signing and the Israel/Jordan signing in the Middle East. She landed many exclusives, including the first and only national television interview of Joseph Hazelwood, the captain of the Exxon Valdez, and an interview with Chinese leader Li Peng on the five-year anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. A former Harvard fellow at the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Pubic Policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, she has three Emmy Awards, a George Foster Peabody Award and the Amnesty International Human Rights Award. Chung was inducted into the University of Maryland Alumni Association Hall of Fame in 2005.

Public Policy

Lisa Calise Signori M.P.M. ’92

If there is late-night number crunching and tough decisions being made in Boston City Hall, Lisa Calise Signori is probably doing it. She joined the city staff in 1994 as a management analyst, and is now a key member of the mayor's cabinet. As director of administration and finance, Signori is squarely in charge of two critical areas that affect the city—human and financial resources. From 2003 to 2007, Signori was the city of Boston's CFO and collector-treasurer. Before that, she served as budget director and supervisor of the Office of Budget Management and as the CFO's chief of staff. Signori launched her career in Boston as an Office of Budget Management analyst, providing extensive analytical support during the Boston City Hospital and Boston University Medical Center merger. Prior to heading to Boston, Signori was a budget examiner at the White House Office of Management and Budget in Washington, D.C.

Undergraduate Studies

Steven Leonard ’78

Life isn't a one-way street for Steven Leonard. As president and CEO of the highly successful American Bus Sales and Service in Annapolis, his values center on "faith, family and friends." His company enjoys a 65 percent share of the region's school bus market and supplies the university those big, black Terp motor coaches. Leonard has built a life focused on people and leadership. He shares his vast knowledge about business and life with Maryland students by volunteering for Letters and Sciences, the academic advising home for undergraduates who are deciding on enrollment in degree-granting majors. Leonard also teaches a course designed to help students transition to university life, and spoke at last year's Individual Studies commencement. Students say his high expectations and passion for the university make him a great teacher and make them better students. Active in business-related councils and committees, Leonard is also a lifetime member of the Alumni Association, member of the Maryland Gridiron Network and supporter of Maryland Club Lacrosse.